London v. Tyrrell, Del. Ch., No. 3321-CC (April 2, 2009), read letter decision here.

Kevin Brady, a highly respected Delaware litigator, has provided us with the following case review.

In a interesting twist on the issue of staying discovery so the Special Litigation Committee can complete its investigation, Chancellor Chandler, in a two-page letter decision on April 2, 2009, granted a request by the Special Litigation Committee of the Board of MA Federal, Inc. d/b/a iGov to stay discovery for 120 days except for the electronic information sought by the plaintiffs in their discovery requests. While the Chancellor did not give a detailed explanation for this exception, he did mention that defendants had represented on March 17, 2009 that they were ready to begin production "on a biweekly basis beginning next week…." The Chancellor went on to state that the defendants had "postponed production of electronic documents long enough. Further delay would only prejudice plaintiffs." While this might be a tacit nod to the dynamic nature of electronic information and the potential for problems associated with preservation and production of electronic information in general, we will have to wait for more details.